[ADXA] bright ideas needed

Thu Mar 21 10:47:40 EDT 2024

You do realize that the “K5OVC rotor” will only turn toward SSB DX, don’t you??   😊

ZN

From: adxa-bounces at mailman.qth.net <adxa-bounces at mailman.qth.net> On Behalf Of Dennis Schaefer
Sent: Thursday, March 21, 2024 9:45 AM
To: charles at mckenziemonuments.com
Cc: ADXA <ADXA at mailman.qth.net>
Subject: Re: [ADXA] bright ideas needed

Thanks, Charles.  I have had good luck with my Ham-IV so far.  I bought it in 1986 and replaced the direction pot once.  That’s about 18 years between repairs.  I know I have been very lucky!  The current antenna is probably 40 lbs and not a tremendous amount of wind loading.  I had a big Mosley, 81 pounds, for years, and it held up.  

I’m going to put in the spare Ham IV, which formerly belonged to K5OVC, and hope the OVC magic holds up!   I will keep in mind the Yaesu suggestions in case I run into any frustrations.  Maybe they even eliminate the necessity of shimming the mast unless it is the exact size.  That’s always an irritant with CDE rotators.

73,

Dennis

On Thu, Mar 21, 2024 at 9:29 AM <charles at mckenziemonuments.com <mailto:charles at mckenziemonuments.com> > wrote:

I gave up on tail twisters and bought a Yaesu 2800 , and a heavier one 
if it fails.
I even hate to give the blinking twisters things away with all the 
issues I had with them!!
If you can stand the little extra an Antenna Genius is a great option, 
it will control 2
rotors, your direction indicator is a compass on the antennas boom. you 
need 2 wires to the
Rotor for power and a cat 5  or 6 to the compass. The genius needs a cat 
5 or 6 cable.
Thats what I am going to for both towers rotation controls. With a 
rotating tower a
piece of PVC attached to the tower just above head height will suffice.
73 KF5TL
Charles

On 2024-03-20 18:58, Dennis Schaefer wrote:
> My rotator quit indicating.  It rotates, but the pot in the motor unit
> has opened up.  I can run outside and see which way it is pointing,
> but that isn't very elegant, especially since my back and neck are
> still a little messed up.  I need a way to temporarily tell the
> direction until I get it fixed.
> 
> I thought about a camera, but the way our house is arranged, the only
> window I can put one in faces West and gets direct sun into the lens
> several hours a day.  Its a cheap camera, and it might not hurt
> anything, but it would make the camera unusable for that time.  I
> could probably get an outdoor-rated camera and point it somewhere out
> of direct sun.  That's the only real solution I can think of.
> 
> The antenna and rotator are on a Hazer that only comes down to the
> garage roof.  I can't climb on the roof anymore, so I think the Hazer
> is going to go away in favor of a more standard configuration.
> Someone who knows way more than I do is coming by later in the week
> and will advise me.
> 
> I will probably put the Force-12 C3 back up but I sure wish there was
> something I could do to make it work better, or at least have a better
> SWR, on 12 meters.  I guess a QRO antenna tuner would be the best
> option.  The 4.5 SWR on 12M doesn't make the amp very happy.  I have a
> Dentron tuner that is stout enough, but it does not have a bypass
> switch.  It would probably be easy to rig something with two switches,
> but that would have the possibility for accidentally running power
> into an open feed would always be there.  The C-3 has two direct
> coupled elements for 10 meters, and one is for operating FM above 28.9
> Mhz.  I wish I knew what would happen if I extended that element to
> make it resonate on 12 meters.  I plan to get help to get this all
> done in one shot, so I don't have the luxury of time for antenna
> experimentation.
> 
> Ideas or comments are welcome!
> 
> 73,
> Dennis
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